The federal government and commercial airlines have been smacked with soaring airport-security costs during the last two years, but the financial impact on Spokane International Airport has been minimal, says SIA spokesman Todd Woodard.


While the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) has paid the salaries of almost 200 security screeners here and has provided $500,000 to remodel personnel space for those workers, the airports budget has changed very little in the past two years, he says. Its overall revenues were about $17 million in 2001 and only down about $300,000 in 2002.


The city of Spokane and Spokane County jointly own the airport, its business park, and Felts Field Municipal Airport and appoint the Spokane Airports Board to oversee those operations, each of which is self-sufficient and doesnt require any local-jurisdiction tax support.


Mark Jucht, director of finance and administration for the airport, says, The biggest thing that has affected the budget is the downturn in travel.


TSA announced last month that it will cut about 6,000 airport-screening jobs later this year, including 42 jobs here. That move will help trim TSAs expenses by $32 million in fiscal year 2003 and $288 million in 2004, says the agency, which had an overall budget of $5.8 billion in 2002.


Jucht estimates that TSA spent more than $6 million in the last year on salaries for the agencys Spokane-based screeners, excluding the cost of uniforms, employee benefits, and Federal Bureau of Investigation background checks of those workers. Federal screeners salaries range from $23,000 to $36,000.


Congress established TSA after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, to manage the nations airport security screeners under a single agency. It employs about 55,600 and is part of the Department of Homeland Security.


Spokane Internationals budget for its police and fire departments hasnt grown since Sept. 11, Woodard says. The 14-person police departments budget, for example, was $965,000 in 2001, $940,000 in 2002, and is $945,000 this year, he says. Although for a time TSA required that airport police officers be stationed at all security checkpoints, the agency recently revoked that rule. Now, as before Sept. 11, officers must be within 5 minutes of the checkpoints, he says.


Felts Field Municipal Airport also has been unaffected by increased security measures, Woodard says. That airport had put in place a new security system for tenants shortly before Sept. 11, he says. Screeners arent required at general-aviation airports, such as Felts Field, although Woodard says that could change.


Its only a matter of time before TSA turns their attention to general aviation and air-cargo airports, he says.


Spokane International Airport generates its own revenues by leasing space to airlines and cargo-carrier companies and by taking a percentage of concession-stand and automobile-rental companies gross revenues. It also charges outbound passengers here $4.50 per departure ticket to cover facility costs, including recent construction projects, and varying amounts to park at the airport. A $2.50 security fee per leg of flight, with a $10 maximum per round trip, is funneled to TSA.


Ridership has dropped since Sept. 11. Last year about 2.75 million passengers traveled through SIA, a 4.5 percent decline from the previous year and a sizable drop from 2000s more than 3 million travelers. Jucht says, though, that those numbers are showing signs of an upswing.


It appears as though those numbers are improving, but we certainly havent returned to the 2001 level, he says.


Retrofitting project undefined


Its undetermined which entity will pay for one project SIA expects will be coming down the pipe: a retrofitting of the nonpublic part of the airport building to accommodate new explosive-detection devices. Under a congressional mandate, TSA bought about 7,100 explosive-detection machines for U.S. airports last year. Woodard says he understands that SIAs equipment is being stored in a warehouse until the airport is retrofitted to handle the multi-ton machinery. SIA has helped design and begin the permit process for the project, he says.


Nico Melendez, the Los Angeles-based spokesman for TSAs western region, says that since each airport is configured differently, retrofit projects will vary in scope and cost.


He says that TSA only plans to retrofit about 20 of the nations 429 airports. The agency hasnt yet named which airports will get those federal funds, and, for security reasons, he declines to give details about what changes are needed at specific airports, including Spokanes.


Woodard says, Our plans are pretty much done . Weve had three different contractors come here (based on TSAs actions). Thats why I was fairly confident that TSA plans to retrofit the Spokane airport.


Because of uncertainties surrounding the project, however, its unclear when it might go to bid and how much it would cost.


Melendez says the federal government and the airlines have covered most of the cost of the increased-security requirements, but individual airports usually incur costs when the nations threat level is raised.


Those costs often come in the form of increased manpower and overtime hours. Although the government has raised the alert level four times since Sept. 11, Jucht says those actions have had minimal financial impact on the Spokane airport.


The airline industry says its carrying a large share of the security-cost burden. The Air Transport Association of America, a trade organization for the major U.S. airlines, says the industry has lost $18 billion in the last two years. The war with Iraq, high fuel prices, and government-imposed changes, such as installing fortified cockpit doors in airplanes, are sinking airlines into an even deeper hole, the association claims.


Since 9/11, taxes, fees, and unfunded mandates have added $4 billion annually to the industrys losses, the association says in a press release posted on its Web site.


Melendez says TSA is reimbursing airlines for some of those costs.